The Tale of a Trooper

by Clutha N. Mackenzie

Now, at midday, came the shout, "Triumph's been torpedoed." Mac jumped on his fire-step, and, looking down the trench, saw beyond it sure enough the poor old Triumph with a heavy list towards him. Some of the fellows had seen the torpedo strike her right amidships, and a great column of water rise high in the air and fall on her decks.

From all directions destroyers, mine-sweepers and pinnaces were concentrating on the doomed vessel. Two destroyers had run their bows alongside her hull, and her crew was swarming off. Her decks grew steeper, but some of the crew seemed to be sticking to their guns to the last in the after turrets. Mac could not discover whether these shots were directed against the submarine or whether they were but the last farewell of the old battleship. Fifteen minutes from the moment she was struck, her decks lay almost at right angles to the water, then the movement quickening, she turned bottom upward, only her red keel, propellers and rudder showing to the troubled troopers who sadly watched the demise of the famous old ship. A quarter of an hour longer she floated, sinking lower and lower, then, with an easy motion, she slid away from sight. For a few minutes a maelstrom of white, surging water foamed and spurted, then, sadly and slowly, the host of small craft which had rushed to the rescue made again for their stations. Destroyers manoeuvred in vain search of the submarine, while battleships and cruisers in a haze of smoke disappeared beyond the horizon. Only a few bright tins, some boards, and a patch of oil marked the spot on the peaceful, azure sea, where, an hour before, a fine old ship, and fifty of her crew, had gone to their doom.

The troopers ate their lunch in stony silence. It seemed they had lost an old friend.

Still, in going about the afternoon's work, they soon forgot their sadness. They had been a fortnight in these trenches, and now they were to be relieved by the Light Horse. It was good getting out after a fortnight there, but it was a darned nuisance moving. When Mac had all his gear up, there was not much of himself left in view. Valise, bandolier, rifle, revolver, glasses, water-bottle, extra ammunition, cooking utensils, haversack, a stove, the day's rations, a bundle of fire-wood, and half a dozen odds and ends had to find space about his person; the Q.M.S., too, usually had something to add to this load. A heavy summer shower did not improve matters, and made the descent of the steep clay paths one of speed rather than elegance. Once started with so heavy a load, it was impossible to pull up. So the descent of his regiment that afternoon from the plateau above was a weird and wonderful sight, and resembled nothing more than a mixed avalanche of perspiring troopers, mud and gear.

They took up their new abode on a steep northerly slope above the sea. Instructions were that all habitations were to be made shrapnel proof, but this was a matter of difficulty on so steep a face. Nightfall found Mac and his section with an awninged platform, six feet square and three feet high and partially walled, but far from shrapnel proof and never likely to be. They were not inclined to meet trouble half-way, so each disposed his equipment in its rightful spot. The four partook heartily of a most sociable evening meal, and then wandered off for a good long bathe in the pleasantly cool water of the AEgean.

* * * * *

The bivouac on the steep slope north of Anzac Cove was hardly the safest, and domestic life there was not the most unruffled. Just when five more seconds would have seen the bacon done to a T, the whistle of the look-out up above would go. That meant that the Turkish battery on the W Hills had delivered itself of a missile, which might, or might not, be directed at this bivouac. Then Mac would find himself in a dilemma. Would he trust to luck that the shell was not for him, and save the bacon, or would he crouch for safety under the protection wall? More often the bacon had the benefit of the decision for meal-time was Abdul's favourite hour for action, and, if Mac took heed of every warning, the section would never get through its meals. He knew that the warning whistle gave him seventeen seconds before the arrival of the shell, and, if he waited for the sound of the discharge, he had about four seconds left. Still they didn't worry much until, after a few opening rounds, Abdul's practice got too good and there was no mistaking his malevolent attentions. Mac, if he were not near his own bivouac, would dive into the nearest one, irrespective of owner, and seek its leeward corners. A few seconds of quiet waiting while he exchanged the time of day with his host; then the burst, the singing whistle of the fragments, the whirr of the nose-cap, and the fut—fut—fut as the pieces came to earth. Then, if another whistle had not sounded, he would thank his host and proceed on his way.

Often would come the cry of "Stretcher-bearer," and the M.O. would hurry up the steep slope to some one who had been hit.

Mac lost his sergeant, a real fine fellow, one morning, while he was serving out rations. The whole regiment was grieved. For the rest of the day his body, shrouded in his grey blanket, lay on a stretcher in his bivouac with as much calm and holy dignity as any royal monarch lying in state.

Soon after dusk, for the little cemetery was under direct machine-gun fire during the day, the regiment gathered, bareheaded and silent, to bury its comrade. Six of the dead soldier's friends lifted the bier, and bore it tenderly down the steep slope and over the bridge across the sap. The regiment followed and gathered round the open grave.